Week 6

Just completed week 6 which completes the speech and language spectrum. Still not seeing much, but seeing a lot. He still talks very quietly. Almost too quietly. Even around other kids, he seems very quiet.

This is very hard to measure as I know he is also very tired from being in camp from 9-5 every day.

Tonight we had a meltdown. He spent the afternoon playing with a friend. The friend was here yesterday and they were at the other house today. He stayed for dinner. He has never had dinner at someone else's house without me. So this was a great milestone. But the day turned out to be less than he had anticipated. The friend is ADD and off his meds for the summer. Apparently he was not very nice. This was hard on Firstborn.

Then he was surprised by the fact that he got home within 5 minutes of bedtime. He decided to postpone bedtime by refusing to brush his teeth. Mom is not having that. So he cried at the top of his lungs. Once he calmed, I tried to lay out the choices again. He screamed again. He calmed again. I reiterated that no action goes without a consequence and that every minute he took putting off brushing was a minute off his bedtime tomorrow night. He screamed and brushed his teeth.

The intensity of this breakdown is much higher than any of his previous breakdowns. He is also very tired. He is a child who needs sleep. When he was three and I left the workplace, he would have tantrums like this daily until I decided to put him back on a two nap a day schedule. He would sleep 2 hours in the morning and 2-3 hours in the afternoon and still be ready for bed by 7:30 at night. But once the new schedule was started, he was so nice to be around. Too bad I can't go back to two naps a day. Maybe if I take two naps a day, I can get through.